iron tester: Shaun Field
‘WICKEDLY NIMBLE’ I COULD QUITE HAPPILY SIT IN THIS machine all day. Heaps more room than the previous model and cruisy ground to run it on here too. People have said in the past they don’t like bogies because they are so long and the turning circle is just too big, but this thing is wickedly nimble and quick and easy to turn. The response of the controls is amazingly fast now too. I would say it is more like a digger in sped which is really saying something. Some previous skidders I’ve run seemed to take heaps of revving to turn the grapple and open and close it, whereas with this thing it’s an instant response and rapid about it. The downside of that would be the speed surprises an operator and they could grab a tyre, but once a safe procedure is set in place this thing is very high production. Despite the wet and muddy conditions, I only needed to engage the diff lock once on the drags. I did and that got the machine moving again nicely.
The Tainui guys said I might struggle to get wood out of this area and up onto Skid 5 but it wasn’t too bad. I thought I had bumped the diff locks on at one stage because I was sledging but it was just because the ruts were so deep and I had a decent load on. These Douglas fir blocks seem to always have really deep topsoil which is prone to turning to crap in the wet. Not sure why but maybe to do with how the foliage breaks down. I’ve always found them to be really slippery compared to pine. They certainly didn’t put me in the cream area and really that’s what we are here for in the rain and mud, to test it out in real conditions. I did have concerns that due to the length of it, this machine would be a bit like a boat to steer but it is very agile and has ample power and manoeuvrability. The new seat rotator Tigercat has designed gives 220 degrees turning. To visualise, that’s more than all the way
Iron Tester, Shaun Field. to the front, allowing you to exit the lefthand side door, plus you can lock the seat in any position with full controls. I have had a bit of an issue with seats lately as one broke off the stump while I was operating in it, and hey I’m not a huge unit or anything, so it’s good to see this one has some serious engineering behind it. They have actually used parts off the grapple snubber on the seat rotator so it is rated for extreme capacity which it will see with all the stumps and
Far left: David Tahau with his new machine. The dozer blade arms have added grease nipples and grease seals to increase service life. Left: Tigercat’s 635H covers a lot of ground. Below: Shaun backs another drag of Douglas fir stems into the surge pile.
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